Although the right to legal representation attaches to a variety of civil actions, most people think of it in terms of criminal cases.

For close to 45 years in New York, such representation has been supplied by a combination of institutional providers such as the Legal Aid Society, and private lawyers assigned to represent indigent defendants on a case-by-case basis.

The latter are commonly referred to as “18-B Lawyers,” the designation being derived from the section of the New York County Law under which they are compensated.

Panels of such lawyers exist for each of the counties within New York City and consist of attorneys who have been screened and trained to serve on them. They are compensated at rates far below what privately retained attorneys would ordinarily receive for the same services.

Notwithstanding this reality, however, the economic climate for lawyers is such that some 18-B attorneys depend on these assignments for their very survival. It is not unusual to find some working out of their homes and without legal secretaries. At the end of each case they handle, they submit a voucher setting forth the hours they spent and a general description of the work they performed.

On Feb. 2, the Bloomberg administration issued a request for bids from institutional providers with a view toward having them take over the bulk of the work currently performed by 18-B attorneys.

Specifically, the mayor is targeting so-called “conflict cases,” in which for one reason or other an institutional provider is currently unable to provide representation.

A classic such instance would arise where two people are arrested for a robbery, and neither of them can afford to retain private counsel. Because of the inherent conflict of interest between them, current practice would result in an institutional provider representing one defendant and an 18-B attorney being assigned to the co-defendant.

Bloomberg wants to change this by having additional institutional providers handle conflict cases as well. Cases involving several defendants in need of representation would presumably still see the appointment of 18-B counsel.

Following Bloomberg’s action and prodded by alarmed 18-B attorneys, bar associations united to protest the plan. Last week, the five county bar associations initiated suit in State Supreme Court in Manhattan alleging that the mayor’s action is illegal and requesting an injunction against its implementation.

Jonathan B. Behrins, the immediate past-President of the Richmond County Bar Association who signed off on the suit for the Staten Island lawyers’ group, maintains that 18-B attorneys provide more personal service to their clients than institutional providers.

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Behrins is probably right about that. And it is certainly true that there are many exceptionally well qualified, unfailingly dedicated 18-B attorneys.

On the other hand, my personal experience has been that institutional providers generally accord their clients better legal representation. Part of the reason is the availability to them of better resources such as comprehensive legal research tools, investigative services, and in-house appeal capability.

Yet these very same taxpayer-financed resources can wind up costing the public needless expense if they are not judiciously reserved for those cases where they are truly necessary. In this regard, I’ve seen instances where institutional providers made mountains out of molehills, and prosecuted appeals that provided no practical benefit to their clients.

Both the mayor and the bar associations are missing the real issue here, and hence the real solution. There is, you see, no mechanism in place to insure that only those who are truly indigent receive free legal representation. Essentially, judges are reduced to taking litigants at their word when they claim to be unable to afford a lawyer.

This could be remedied by requiring every applicant to complete a comprehensive financial affidavit supporting his or her claim.

While the exigencies of the moment would preclude auditing such affidavits on the spot, they should be subject to random auditing in the days and months that follow.

Those found to have lied should then be required to reimburse the public for the expenses of their legal representation. Their false affidavits should also be referred to prosecutors for possible perjury charges.

During the course of my years on the Family Court bench, I repeatedly heard allegedly indigent litigants explain that they were late for court because their car service didn’t pick them up on time. Which, of course, led me to inquire why, if they really couldn’t afford counsel, they weren’t taking the bus. And I guarantee that today’s judges are hearing the same kinds of nonsense.

While bar associations may generally have lofty motives for opposing Bloomberg’s proposal, it would be naive not to factor in the reality that many 18-B lawyers make their living handling these cases, and that many of their supposedly indigent clients are not really indigent at all.

The latter, of course, would apply with equal force to many represented by institutional providers. Which is precisely why the most urgent need and, hence, the most important first step is to stop handing out free lawyers to those who can afford to hire their own.

[Daniel Leddy’s column appears each Tuesday on the Advance Editorial Page. His e-mail address is JudgeLeddy@si.rr.com.]